Big Lottery Fund pledges £1m for Wick community centre

Delight for Pultneneytown People’s Project over huge advance towards ambition

By Jane Candlish

Published:

Plans for a new community centre at Wick have taken a step forward after the announcement of a £1million grant from the Big Lottery Fund.

The Pultneneytown People’s Project aims to build the multi-purpose centre on land at Huddart Street, enabling the group to relocate all activities to one location.

The centre will include space for childcare, arts and sports, a community cafe, IT suite, hall and offices.

The project’s chief executive officer, Katrina MacNab, said the group was delighted.

She added: “This major commitment of £1million allows us to take our ambitions another step forward.

“The centre will be a fantastic resource to Wick and the surrounding areas as it will enhance training opportunities as well as providing an arts venue, cafe, creche, youth cafe, community space and office accommodation in the heart of the community.”

The Caithness group is one of five in Scotland to benefit from the Growing Community Assets programme.

Also in the Highlands, the Kilmuir and Logie Easter Action and Development Group (Kale) received £587,719 for its plans to create a new community facility attached to Milton Primary School, in Easter Ross.

The facility will provide a range of services for 14 groups and 2,000 local people, including IT access, careers advice and literacy and debt support. It will include two social enterprises providing wrap-around childcare and a handyman service.

Kale chairwoman Rose Hazell said: “This will help realise a long-held dream of the community to be able to address identified needs by providing local services from a purpose-designed facility.

“This will also provide the springboard for future growth and will give our community the opportunity to help themselves.”

Big Lottery Fund chairwoman Alison Magee said: “The funding from our Growing Community Assets scheme will help five communities to acquire and develop local assets that can be grown to create new services and build local skills.

“As part of today’s investment, we are awarding £1million to help create a new community and training facility in the centre of Pulteneytown. It has been a long-held ambition of the local community to bring its existing services under one roof and to provide new activities and training opportunities for local people.”

The other projects receiving funding were Furniture Plus Ltd, of Dalgety Bay, Fife, which gets £19,950, Lambhill Stables, Glasgow, which gets £384,279, and Fauldhouse Community Development Plus Ltd, West Lothian, which receives £377,943.